


How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate

by electricblueninja



Series: The Five Love Languages [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon Compliant, Fluff, Idiots in Love, M/M, Matchmaker Sam Winchester, Supportive Sam Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:00:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27087484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electricblueninja/pseuds/electricblueninja
Summary: Sam leaves Castiel some reading material to help him understand the ways Dean talks without talking.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Series: The Five Love Languages [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1988281
Comments: 2
Kudos: 71





	How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate

The title is "The Five Love Languages". Underneath that, it says "How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate".

It is sitting on the table just inside my door, and I am 95% certain that Sam is the one who has left it there. He tends to be the most bookish of the bunker's residents.

I thought it was a joke at my expense, so I confronted him, and asked him what he meant by it.

He just laughed at me. Smiling, he said, "Read it, Cas. Trust me. It's important. Think of it as research. You know, about the human condition." 

Sam has a strange sense of humour, but he is basically good-natured, and he seemed sincere, so I did as he suggested.

Mr Chapman does express some interesting ideas. He believes that humans have five ways of expressing love to one another. The love 'languages' which he describes are 'words of affirmation', 'quality time', 'receiving gifts', 'acts of service', and 'physical touch'. He also writes about the misunderstandings that may occur when an individual expresses love to another using a 'language' that is not mutually understood.

I have just finished reading the book through for a second time. It has made me think about the differences between me and my human companions. Of course there can be confusion between us, if we do not value certain things in the same ways. 

Tossing the paperback onto the bed beside me, I sit back against the pillows and contemplate each of these so-called languages.

'Acts of service'. This one, I understand. Serving a higher cause is the sole reason for my existence. I lived to serve Heaven, once; now, it is the Winchesters. Dean, primarily, but Sam too, because Sam is the most important person in the world to him. They come as a set: there is no one without the other. So...acts of service. If I were to regard myself, for the purposes of applying the information in the book, as a human, then this one is likely my 'primary love language'.

Then there is 'quality time'. Time shared between two beings, for no other purpose than sharing it, in a state of togetherness. Yes, this one I understand too. It is not just the act of sharing a space. It is the eye contact; the smile; asking questions; listening to the answers. Caring about what is going on in another being's internal world. Feeling connected. I would like more of this. Too often, my quality time is only stolen moments in the Impala's passenger seat, and there is little eye contact at those times: it is best for Dean to keep his eyes on the road when he drives.

If I were human, I suppose this one would be my secondary 'love language'.

Then there are 'words of affirmation'. This also, to an extent, makes sense to me. The satisfaction of praise after completing a Heavenly mission, the thanks humans have given me when I heal or otherwise assist them, and the way I feel when Dean tells me he is proud of me all suddenly make sense. And since meeting him, selfish and foolish as it may be, I find that I do want Dean's approval. I want to see him exhale shakily and laugh nervously, breathlessly, when I vanquish his enemies; to say my name aloud; to pray to me; to tell me that we are friends, and that he needs me.

'Receiving gifts' and 'physical touch', on the other hand, have not been a strong feature of my centuries of existence. 

Perhaps it is because of my species and the dimension I used to live in that I find it difficult to recognise gifts and touches as acts of love.

Dean's mixtape, for example. A gift, though I did not understand until he explained to me that that was what it was. He wanted to give me something. He wanted me to keep it. But I did not understand the significance of his gesture--not until I saw it in my own 'language'. It was not until I looked upon it as an act of service that I understood its significance. He made it for me. _For_ me. For _me._

Finally, there is physical touch, and I must confess that my vessel understands this one. On some level, my consciousness and the physical sensations that I experience through this human form are aligned. Even if I do not fully understand the language of physical touch, either my vessel or me--I am unclear which is responsible--certainly responds. There is something to be said for the warmth and safety of being drawn against another physical form. Dean, in particular, has a way of pressing himself against me that is superficially rough and brusque, but in fact deeply tender. I think it is the way that his face speaks wordlessly of discomfort whenever we embrace, but the weight of his body falls against mine, trusting, and his hands pull me close, almost always, unconsciously, pressing hard against the place from which my wings, in another dimension, extend. I don't think he realises how that feels to me. How could he know? It is an eerie sensation, painfully intimate in a way that he cannot and should not know.

Touch and gifts--the love languages of Dean Winchester.

Which leads me to wonder what, exactly, Sam is suggesting.


End file.
